Useful website for Life on the Margins (Unit 4, Year 13)

World Disasters Report 2011- Focus on hunger and malnutrition



This year’s World Disasters Report focuses on the growing crisis of hunger and malnutrition. Smallholder farmers who produce half the world’s food are among the almost 1 billion people who go to bed hungry every night. Millions of children suffer the irreversible effects of undernutrition. Increasing food insecurity weakens people’s resilience to disasters and disease, and people everywhere are experiencing the increasing volatility of food prices.


“ Hunger and malnutrition are the worst enemies of humankind. They deny to children – even at birth – an opportunity for the full expression of their innate genetic potential for physical and mental development. Freedom from hunger is the first requisite for sustainable human security. This will depend upon the productivity, profitability and sustainability of agriculture, as this edition of the World Disasters Report points out. Therefore, if food and nutrition policies go wrong, nothing else will have a chance to go right."



– M. S. Swaminathan, an Indian MP

Click on the titleto be taken to the website where you can find the report

Pakistan Floods

At least 369 people have died and 700,000 are living in refugee camps because of flooding in southern Pakistan, the country's national disaster authority said Thursday.

The flooding in Sindh province has destroyed 1.5 million homes in 41,000 villages, the government said. About 8.2 million people have been affected. Along with the deaths, more than 740 people have been injured.

About 67 percent of food stocks have been destroyed and nearly 37 percent of the livestock has been lost "or sold to avoid loss," Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said earlier this week.
"At least 5 million surviving animals are at risk, lacking feed and shelter and facing increased exposure to debilitating diseases and worm infestations," Byrs said.
The United Nations' World Food Programme has been distributing food to thousands of people.
More than 6,000 schools have been damaged by the floods and 1,363 education facilities are currently being used as relief distribution sites in Sindh, officials said.


Click on the title to be taken to more details and some video footage from the Telegraph.
Click on the photo to be be taken to more images of the flood.